AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman. On Friday night, the first-ever Presidential Forum on Environmental Justice was held at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg. Six Democratic presidential candidates too part: Senators Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker, Tom Steyer, Marianne Williamson, John Delaney and Joe Sestak. I co-moderated the event with Mustafa Ali, former official with the Environmental Protection Agency, vice president of the National Wildlife Federation. We’ll be airing highlights of the forum in the coming weeks, but today we turn to Senator Elizabeth Warren. Mustafa Ali began the questioning.

MUSTAFA ALI: Many communities of color, low-income communities and indigenous populations are literally dying for a breath of fresh air. We have 100,000 people who are dying prematurely from air pollution in our country — communities like the Manchester community in Houston, Texas, to Cancer Alley running between Baton Rouge and Louisiana, oh, even here in Charleston, South Carolina. What would you do to address the epidemic that’s happening in our communities from air pollution?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: So, part of it is we need to strengthen the Environmental Protection Agency. Here’s a radical notion: How about if we don’t have a coal lobbyist to head up the EPA? You think that’s a good starting place? But it is. As they have tried to roll back — the Trump administration and the EPA, under his administration, have tried to roll back air quality standards. We need — no, we need to go in the other direction: We need to roll forward. And so we need to be much stronger on this.

*But can I add a second part to that? Because I think it’s really important. And that is, I want to bring in the CDC. I want to treat this as the public health emergency that it is. Yeah. If people were dying of a mysterious virus, if it were cutting lives short in well-to-do communities, you better believe that we’d be coming in with the research, we’d be highlighting where the problems are, and we’d be figuring out how to fix them and to fix them fast. Instead, we just watch over and over and over how children who live in poor communities, who live in communities of color have higher rates of hospitalization for asthma. Why? Because what they burn in Ohio, you breathe in Massachusetts, and it’s hard on our children, because our children are the most vulnerable, and they live next to the places that are the dirtiest, that have the worst air. So, I actually want to treat this — I want to come in aggressively and treat this like the public health emergency that it is. I want the scientists on it, and I want to put the real resources behind fixing it.

MUSTAFA ALI: Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: Tom Steyer said he would declare a state of climate emergency the first day he were president. Would you do the same?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: We could. You know, here’s how I think of this. I want to use the tools available as president. And the way I think of using the tools, I want to think about what — I love saying this — a president can do all by herself. And the way I think of that is part of what I mentioned here. What I want to do is I want to make a position in the White House that is a permanent, ongoing position to address the injustices that we currently face on this issue. So, for me, what I have committed to do is both to create a position in the White House, and in the first hundred days not just to do it all by myself on this one, but to ask the groups that have been on the frontlines to be part of this, to come together and to start putting together an action plan.

And the reason I say that is, when we’re talking about the question of environmental justice, it’s a highly localized problem. You need national muscle. You need national money. You need a national will to get in there and fix the problem. But you don’t need someone at the national level saying, “Here’s the right answer.” Because the answer is different. It’s different on tribal lands out West than it is in sinking cities near the coast. It is different to be near a dump that smolders and burns than it is to be near a factory that continues to put poisons into the water. And so, for each of those, the way I see this is you make the concrete commitment on finances, you make the concrete commitment on bringing people together, and then you ask the communities to identify what needs to be done.

And then, if I can, the third part is we have to look at this holistically. It’s not just about cleaning up the dumps. It’s not just about making the factories either filter what they’re putting into the air and the water or shutting down. It’s also about lifting these communities up, because these communities have been damaged for generation after generation. So, it’s about investments — which I’d love to talk about — in housing. It’s about economic investments, investments in schools. It’s about making the investments in these communities, so we go from communities that, as you say, are literally killing people to communities that are actually thriving. That’s what I want to see.

AMY GOODMAN: Where do you stand, not just on the Dakota Access pipeline being built? It has been now, and it’s operating at a great capacity. But now the Standing Rock Sioux are in court. They’re saying a proper environmental impact statement wasn’t done and that the Dakota Access pipeline should be shut down. Do you agree with this? What would you do as president, both on Dakota Access pipeline, the Keystone XL, that President Trump greenlighted, and pipelines, overall, across the country?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: So, let me start by saying I believe we ought to enforce our environmental laws. And when the appropriate environmental impact statements have not been done, then, yes, we should shut down the operations. That’s what it means to have these laws, is that we enforce these laws.

But if I can, I want to add an extra piece, because I think this really brings in the question of tribal governance and tribes’ abilities to be the good stewards of their land. I have already made a very public commitment to the tribes, both to honor that the tribes themselves make the decision about what happens on tribal lands — this is a nation-to-nation relationship. This is about our trust and treaty obligations. But I go a step further and to say on federal lands that abut tribal lands, that, as president, I will not approve any drilling, mining, pipelines that abut those lands, on these federal lands that abut the tribal lands, unless the tribes that are affected give their own informed consent in advance. I believe that they will be the good stewards of the land, and I believe they will protect the region.

AMY GOODMAN: Are you for the shutting down of the Dakota Access pipeline?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

MUSTAFA ALI: And how would you better protect? You know, we have this shrinking of our federal lands. You know, they have opened it up to mining and drilling and all these other types of things. What would you do as president to better protect our federal lands?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Well, like I said, this is one a president can do all by herself. And on day one, I will say, “No new drilling, no new mining, on our federal lands, and no offshore drilling.” You just shut it down. And, you know, that’s actually a pretty big impact, because, as you know, about a quarter of our lands are federally protected lands.

And right now this is really this fundamental question: who government works for. So, right now the mining companies, the drilling companies, that want to make big dollars by basically getting drilling rights and mining rights for pennies on the dollar and leaving behind waste for not only local communities to have to deal with, for the tribes to have to deal with, but destroying pristine land for generations to come. I believe that we have both a strong economic — I’ll start there — obligation, but also a strong moral obligation, to protect our public lands and make sure they remain safe. I have fought the Trump’s administration’s efforts to try to undo protection of our federal lands, and I will be a careful protector of those lands.

You know, I’ll just add on this. I know we talk about the huge ramifications. For me, it’s also personal. My husband and I are hikers. We’ve hiked much of these — many of these federal lands for decades now. And when we were hiking not long ago, we were talking about what it would mean if our grandchildren won’t come and see what we see, if our grandchildren will be denied the opportunity to come out and see some of the greatest beauties on this Earth. We have an obligation to future generations. It’s not about what they will inherit; it’s about what we are borrowing from them. And we must meet that obligation. We must meet it, because it is right for our country, because it is right for this world, but also because it is morally right. We need to live our values.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you think Tom Perez, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is wrong to say no to a debate specifically on the climate crisis?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: How can you prevail upon him and the DNC to change their mind?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: I’ve already weighed in on this one, quite publicly, and asked for a climate debate. Obviously, I haven’t prevailed on that. But I did this many months ago, because I think this is the urgent issue of our time. You know, I don’t have to say it to you, but it is worth repeating every chance we get, that climate change threatens every living thing on this planet, and that everything else we talk about depends on our having an Earth that we can live on for generations to come. So, I think, as Democrats, we should be happy to get together to lift this issue. As I said, I’m happy to be here now, in this forum, to lift this issue for people all around the country and all around the world. The United States is a leader on climate. We are. Right now we’re just leading in the wrong direction. We need to show that that’s not all of America, that is not who we are as Americans, that we treasure this land and we treasure this planet and we’re willing to put real resources behind protecting it.

MUSTAFA ALI: Well, Senator Warren, we know that communities of color, frontline communities, are hit first and worst —

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

MUSTAFA ALI: — from climate change, from Puerto Rico, where we lost over 3,000 lives, to Princeville, North Carolina, founded by freed slaves and have had to deal with these devastating floods. We used to talk about 50-year floods. Now we’re talking about 100-year floods and 500-year floods, all the way, of course, to what happened in New Orleans from Katrina. So, we asked the previous candidate who was sitting in the chair that you are, “What would be your boldest move on climate change?” What would be yours?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: A trillion dollars. That seems pretty bold. No, this is important. This is why I said I think it’s important to have specifics around this. And it’s really easy to say, “I’ve got a” — for someone, a candidate, to say, “Here’s a big climate plan. And, oh, yeah, we’ll think about environmental justice somewhere along the way,” and get it and say the right things, but somehow, in the decision-making, it just never happens. I don’t want to be that president. I want to be a president who commits in advance and says, “We know we have a serious problem here.”

So, I’ve got a plan to put about $3 trillion into climate remediation, direct dollars out of the federal government, a lot of leverage out of that. What I’d do is I’d commit to take a third of that and say we’re going to spend it on environmental justice. We’re going to spend it on going to the communities that are hit first, that are hit hardest, that have been hit the longest, generation after generation. As I said, I don’t want to dictate from Washington what it takes. You know, it may be a seawall in one place; it may be a sandbar in a different one. It may be relocation in some — you hate to say it, but it may be. There are all kinds of differences in how it should happen. And that’s the respect for the communities and for the community groups that have been fighting this for so long. But the role of the federal government is to protect. The role of the federal government is to provide the resources. The role of the federal government is to make sure that, as a country, we leave no communities behind.

MUSTAFA ALI: Let me just follow up real quickly on that. And I appreciate what you’re sharing with us. But the reality is, is that there are some states that have not had the best relationship with our most vulnerable communities. So, if we have a trillion, two trillion, three trillion dollars on the federal level, how will we ensure on the state level that they do the right things to address the impacts that are happening in our communities?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Good question. So let me do this both ways. On the federal dollars, they don’t have to go to the states. You can make the federal dollars go straight to the communities, so that communities have the ability to come in and say, “Here’s our problem. We qualify for federal funds,” so you don’t have a governor or state legislature in between sucking up that money, that comes in buckets and ends up being distributed to some communities with an eyedropper. So, that’s part one.

But the second part, I think, is — you are right. We need states to have their own environmental laws. We should do this at the federal level, but we need environmental enforcement at the state level, and environmental rules that are appropriate to those states. I think the best way we make that happen is when we strengthen the groups on the ground. So, think of it as an action like this. When you’ve got a federal government, when you’ve got a president who is really committed on environmental issues, and you’ve got a lot of local groups that both have the ability to get to funding, have the ability to make a difference in their communities, that strengthens those groups. That strengthens those communities. And that gives them a lot more muscle to deal with state governments that may otherwise have overlooked them.

AMY GOODMAN: We’ll be back with presidential candidate Senator Elizabeth Warren in 30 seconds.

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AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, as we continue our coverage of the first-ever Presidential Forum on Environmental Justice, held Friday night in South Carolina at South Carolina State University. Former EPA official Mustafa Ali and I questioned Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren.

AMY GOODMAN: Senator Warren, you’ve said a crucial distinction between you and Bernie Sanders is that you’re capitalist and he’s a socialist. Many activists, though, say that an economic system based on perpetual growth is fundamentally at odds with a stable, clean and sustainable environment. How do you reconcile this?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: So, you know, the way I see this, I believe in markets. I think markets bring us a lot of innovation, a lot of creation, a lot of change, that’s good. I want to see, for example, markets for clean — not just clean energy, but how we’re going to clean the carbon out of the air, how we’re going to clean the filth out of the water. But understand this: Markets without rules are theft. They’re theft. It allows, whenever you get a chance, when you have a market that people get to — corporations get to cheat people, that’s theft. That’s not a market. And that’s not how markets are supposed to operate. So, my efforts, for many years now, have been about how we get those markets to function so that we get the best out of the markets, but that people don’t get cheated.

And maybe the best example of that is, in the early 2000s — I’ll just give you an example — toasters. I’m sorry, I’m not going to start with my toaster story; I’ll just start it with mortgages. Mortgages were so dangerous and so complex that someone who got a mortgage had a one-in-five chance of losing their home over that mortgage — not through a fire, but for through foreclosure. Communities of color were targeted for the worst-of-the-worst mortgage. And the government, they weren’t on the side of the people. They were deep in the pockets of the big banks — in fact, so deep that they let the big banks sell enough of those mortgages to crash the entire economy.

So, after that crash, I had an idea. And the idea was for a consumer agency, that would come in just like a consumer agency that protects you from buying toasters that would burst into flames, a consumer agency that would protect people who are buying mortgages and credit cards and student loans, and be on the side of the consumer. And people told me, “Don’t even try to do it, because you’ll never get it passed. The big banks will stop you — big money, the Republicans and, frankly, a whole bunch of the Democrats.” But it was the right thing to do. So I got in that fight. A bunch of consumer groups helped out in that fight. And we took on Wall Street, we took on the big money, and President Obama signed that agency into law in 2010. It has now — yes! And here’s the thing. It has now forced those financial institutions to return more than $12 billion directly to people who were cheated.

Now, we know how to make government work for the people. And that means you’ve got to have rules. I don’t want to get rid of those devices. I don’t want to get rid of credit cards. I kind of like my credit card. I just don’t want them to be able to cheat me or anyone else. For me, that’s what this is all about.

AMY GOODMAN: Can I follow up —

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Sure.

AMY GOODMAN: — ask you to respond to two different men? Bernie Sanders says there should be no billionaires. Do you agree with that?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: No.

AMY GOODMAN: Why not?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Look, somebody has a great idea, and they follow it through, and they work hard, and they build something. Good for them. But here’s my pitch. You build a great fortune in this country, good for you. But you built it, at least in part, using workers all of us helped pay to educate. You built it, at least in part, getting your goods to market on roads and bridges all of us helped pay to build. You built it, at least in part, protected by police and firefighters all of us helped pay their salaries for. So, here’s my view. You make it to the top, to the tip-top, then the answer is: Pay a wealth tax, so that we can invest and create opportunities for everyone else. That’s what my two-cent wealth tax is all about.

AMY GOODMAN: So, the second man I want you to respond to is Mark Zuckerberg — right?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: — CEO of Facebook, who said that a Warren presidency would suck for his company. That was in an audio leak that came out.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Boo hoo.

AMY GOODMAN: Which brings me to the Climate Accountability Institute, which said the world’s wealthiest corporations are most responsible for the climate crisis —

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: — which of course impacts most, people of color and poorest communities. More than 70% of global emissions come from just 100 companies.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: What do you think should be done to challenge this, change this? What would you do as president? And what are you doing as senator?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Well, part one is we can regulate it. Look, three industries — three industries, we put serious regulations in place and say there can’t be any new buildings, any new homes built — after 2028, zero carbon emission; 2030, zero carbon emission on all automobiles and light trucks produced; and by 2035, zero carbon emission on all electric production. Three industries. We can cut carbon emission in the United States of America by 70%. Three industries. So, there’s one of your tools, is regulation, right there. You’ve got to be willing to come in on the regulation.

But let me make another point about this. Understand, those giant companies you’re talking about, yeah, they do a lot of terrible things, but they also have a lot of power, and they exercise that power. They exercise that power over their workers. They exercise it over their customers, over the communities where they’re located, and over the government in Washington. That is corruption, pure and simple. And we need to call it out and fight back. What I want to do on the first day as president, the legislation I want to push through is anti-corruption legislation. I want to get in there and fight the oil companies, the big polluters, because here’s the deal. Anybody who comes up here and tells you about their climate plans, who doesn’t have an anti-corruption plan, who doesn’t have a plan to beat back the influence of money in Washington, is not serious. Oh, we’ll end up with a plan that has some great name like “Cleaned Up the Entire World and It’s Now Full of Unicorns and Butterflies,” but what it will really do is continue to carve out enough exceptions that the profits keep flowing to the same people who are getting those profits right now. So, I’m out there to fight this corruption. That has to be step number one, is to go after them. I will —

AMY GOODMAN: Should corporate executives who pollute go to jail?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: If they do harm to people, they need to be held responsible. And I actually have a bill already on this. You shouldn’t be able to walk away from the injuries you create. No one should be able to do that in the United States.

We’ve got a problem right now in this country. And the problem we’ve got is too much power is concentrated in the hands of the wealthy and the well-connected. And they are using it every single day to keep Washington exactly where they want it. You know, it’s not only what Donald Trump has done and the Environmental Protection Agency. It’s decades of this. People talk about a Washington that doesn’t work. Puh! Washington works great — if you’re rich! Washington works great — if you run a giant corporation.

Understand, when this administration wanted to get something done — tax cuts for their big donors — you know how long it took them? Five weeks. They went behind closed doors with their big donors and the lobbyists, scribbled out the bill, and passed it, and a trillion-and-a-half dollars went out the door, mostly to giant corporations and rich people. They know how to get something done.

When nothing is getting done on climate, when nothing is getting done on gun safety, when nothing is getting done on the cost of prescription drugs, ask yourself who benefits from that. Right? It’s the gun industry. It’s the polluters. It’s the drilling industry. It’s the pharmaceutical industry. They are getting the Washington they want. What 2020 is all about is it’s time for us to get the Washington that works for the people, not the one that just works for the big corporations. Yeah.

MUSTAFA ALI: Senator Warren, we’re going to go to a question from one of our students.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Sure.

MUSTAFA ALI: So, if Vladmire Haynes could come forward and pose your question to Senator Warren?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: It’s good to see you.

VLADMIRE HAYNES: Hello. How are you?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: I’m good.

VLADMIRE HAYNES: I’m Vladmire Haynes. My question for you, Senator Warren, is: How can you ensure that no community will be left behind when it comes to the fight of environmental injustice? And I am a junior agribusiness major, as well as a member of the SCSU football team.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Whoa! What position do you play?

VLADMIRE HAYNES: Fullback and tight end.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: All right! All right! It’s good to see you, and it’s a good question.

I think the way we do that is we make specific commitments. We can’t make environmental justice an afterthought. It has to be a part of our climate plan design from the beginning. So, partly, this is why I talk about a commitment, a financial commitment, that goes to the frontline and fenceline communities. Partly, it’s why I talk about the commitment to our Native American tribes and their dominion over not just their tribal lands, but the lands that are adjacent to them, because that’s what it takes to protect our Earth. Partly, it’s about attacking the health aspects, coming at this from a different perspective, so that we start to look at this as a public health problem and we lift that up. I think, in each case, the more attention we can bring and the more directions, that’s how we make sure that the communities that have been hardest hit are not left behind.

This is why, as president, I want to make this a part of what I do in the White House. I don’t want it something that people just come in — and by the way, I should add to that, I want to make it a part of what every agency does. So, I want our agencies, I want our banking regulators, to be thinking about climate risk. Think about that. I want them to be thinking about that. I want the — I want our Department of Labor to be thinking about what it means. The Trump administration has rolled back protections for people who work in dangerous areas, what they breathe, what kind of chemicals they’re exposed to. I want each and every one of our departments to have someone at the top, near the top, who is thinking about the environmental impact of what happens, what that agency approves of, what that agency is responsible for, and what it means in the communities that are most affected. We need a lot of change, big change, but I believe we can do this together. This is one of these that’s about leadership at the top, and it’s about powerful communities at the grassroots all across this country. That’s how we make change.

MUSTAFA ALI: Senator Warren, just a quick question. So, many of our most vulnerable communities are being gentrified.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

MUSTAFA ALI: They’re being gentrified from the impacts from climate change. They are being gentrified by the guise of revitalization. What would you do about this displacement that is continuing to happen?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: So, can I just do this one — I’ll start on housing, because this is the biggest area. We’ve got a housing crisis in this country. Gentrification is certainly part of it, but think about it in a larger context. Two generations ago, where was the source of new housing for working families, for the working poor, for the poor poor? Where was it? You had two places. One were private developers. They’re not there anymore. They’re not building that housing; they’re building McMansions. And I’m not mad at them; that’s where their profits are. But they’ve left the area. I grew up in a two-bedroom, one-bath little house. It was in the last row of — last street in Norman, Oklahoma. The garage had been converted into a bedroom for my three brothers. Nobody is building that house anymore. There are not private developers.

Second part is federal government, that used to pump money into housing and has really largely backed out of that. So, I have a plan for that. And that is to build about 3.2 million new housing units across America. We need more housing in America. And this is housing for working families. It’s housing for the working poor. It’s housing for the poor poor. It’s housing for the homeless. It’s housing for seniors who want to be able to age in place. It’s housing for people with disabilities who need specially outfitted housing. It’s housing for people who are returning from prison and who need a place to be able to live. We need to build more housing in this country. An independent analysis shows that my plan would reduce rents across the nation by about 10%. And what they do is they let people — we’ve got to get these down into the communities. They let people stay in the communities. They let people have new housing in those communities, housing that they can afford and be part of.

And then, one other little part, when you’re talking about housing, is the role that housing plays in wealth. You know, the number-one savings plan in America is buy a house, for middle-class families. Number-one retirement plan, live in your house and try to pay it off and then live on your Social Security when you retire. It’s the number-one way that wealth is transmitted from one generation to the next. If grandma and grandpa can hold onto the house until they pass, there’s something there for the kids and the grandkids and the great-grandkids. So it should be no surprise to you that for generations the American government, the federal government, subsidized the purchase of housing for white people and discriminated against the purchase of housing for black people. It’s called redlining. And it created a black-white wealth gap that continues even to this day because of the generational effects, as well as what’s happened in these communities.

So, my housing plan is not only about 3.2 million new housing units across this country, in little communities and big cities all across America. It also says we’ve got to stop and recognize the racial dimension of what happened here. So, I have first-time homebuyer assistance for people who live in formerly redlined communities, and people who were targeted during the financial crash and lost their homes, so we give people a chance to get back on level footing. We can’t keep passing these laws that are racially neutral on their face, where we say, “Oh, same housing for everybody.” We’ve got to acknowledge the past wrongs that are still felt today, the past official discrimination of the United States government that is still felt today, and we’ve got to take steps toward making that right. And that’s what my housing plan is about.

AMY GOODMAN: Senator Warren, just 30 seconds left. But speaking about racial injustice, do you think the order of the primary states should change? You have Iowa and New Hampshire —

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Wait, let me make — let me just — before you finish, are you actually going to ask me to sit here and criticize Iowa and New Hampshire?

AMY GOODMAN: No, I’m asking about the order.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: No, that is what Iowa and New Hampshire are all about.

AMY GOODMAN: But let me just ask. They’re two of the whitest states in the country, and then we move to South Carolina with a very significant population of people of color, and it means the candidates spend so much of their time catering to those first two states. Overall, do you think that should change?

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Look, I’m just a player in the game on this one. And I am delighted to be in South Carolina. Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: Thank you so much.

MUSTAFA ALI: Thank you, Senator.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: It’s good to see you.

AMY GOODMAN: Thank you.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: 2020 presidential candidate Senator Elizabeth Warren, speaking at the first-ever Presidential Forum on Environmental Justice Friday night. I co-moderated the forum with former EPA official Mustafa Santiago Ali. It was hosted by the NBCSL. That’s the National Black Caucus of State Legislators. It took place at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, site of the 1968 Orangeburg massacre. Senator Cory Booker, Tom Steyer, Marianne Williamson, John Delaney and Joe Sestak also took part in the forum. Visit democracynow.org to see the full event. Share it with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. Special thanks to Miriam Barnard, Denis Moynihan, John Hamilton, Libby Rainey and Carla Wills. I’m Amy Goodman. Thanks so much for joining us.